


Winter Wonderland

by nothingwithoutyouxo



Category: Spring Awakening - Sheik/Sater
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Christmas, F/F, Fluff and Crack, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-24
Updated: 2018-11-24
Packaged: 2019-08-28 20:46:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16730334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothingwithoutyouxo/pseuds/nothingwithoutyouxo
Summary: Ice skating, bad Christmas movies, and a proposal. What more could you want from the holiday season?





	Winter Wonderland

**Author's Note:**

> Hey everyone! It's November 25th which means we're one month until Christmas so here's a fic to celebrate! I hope you all have a wonderful holiday season, in whatever form that may take for you :)

Dusk truly was the most beautiful time of the day. The sun was slowly slipping towards the horizon, leaving the sky in soft shades of amber and pink in its wake. The trees around them were caked in sugar. The lights of the ice rink were slowly starting to come on, illuminating everything with just a little too much brightness, but Wendla didn’t care about that. Not at all. What she cared about was the feeling of her girlfriend’s hand in hers and the sounds of laughter around her. The steady scraping of her skates on the ice and the occasional small gust of wind that tickled her nose and eyelashes. Those were what mattered.

 

Ice skating had been a good idea. She couldn’t quite remember if it had been hers, but she’d take credit for it if given the chance. With winter settling in and speeding towards the end of the year, and well into the holiday season, stepping away from everything just for a moment and spending some time with the people that mattered to her was what she needed most. This time of year had always been her favourite when she was little. When she would spend Hanukkah with her family and stay up all night talking about how exciting it was with her sister. As she got older that started to change. There was more stress involved now. Pretty much all of her friends worked in either retail or hospitality, so this season wasn’t anyone’s favourite as a result. She was hoping that a night like this would change their minds. Even just a little. Truthfully, Wendla was hoping that the snow would help, that it would bring some of that magic back.

 

For the most part it seemed to be working. She wasn’t sure if it was the ice itself, or just the cold weather in general, but her friends were happy. Hanschen, being the absolute show off that he was, had headed straight for the center as soon as his skates had hit the ice, and of course he had to remind them all that he’d done more than a few figure skating lessons as a kid. Ernst was having quite the time keeping up with him, but Wendla could hear him laugh no matter which side of the ice she was on. Martha, Anna and Thea had created a friendship chain, linking their hands together and hoping that between the three of them they’d be able to go the whole time without falling over. So far, they’d been successful with that. Georg had already fallen over three times, and with Otto just laughing instead of helping him up, it was easy to tell that he was getting just a little bit frustrated. All it took was for Otto for quickly kiss his cheek and take his hand again and that all disappeared.

 

Moritz was the only one of them that absolutely refused to go onto the ice. Melchior was staying with him, the two of them sitting on the makeshift stands and talking quietly amongst themselves, eyes flicking between their friends and each other. Wendla knew that the they would both join them eventually. Melchior could be pretty persuasive when it came to these things, and he knew that he just needed to help get Moritz’s anxiety towards doing new things in check. With a good amount of _I love you_ s and promises that _it’ll be fun_ and _I won’t let you fall_ , Moritz would definitely come around. Not to mention that Moritz knew how much Melchior loved skating, and that alone should help reassure him. Wendla just wanted everyone to have the best night that they possibly could.

 

“Are there Hanukkah angels?” Ilse asked, squeezing Wendla’s hand gently to get her attention. The two of them were slowly making their way around the edge of the rink, skirting carefully around small children with their parents who were either giggling or absolutely horrified. They were competent enough that they didn’t need to be too close to wall, making it easier to just glide along next to each other, hand in hand. Ilse didn’t think she’d ever been happier.

 

Wendla laughed. “Depends what you mean by that.”

 

Ilse shrugged, unable to stop herself from smiling. “Well, there’s Christmas angels that you can put on top of Christmas trees. You don’t have a tree, but do you still have angels?”

 

“I don’t have a tree currently, but I used to. We had a small tree when I was little, for the experience mostly, not because we celebrated Christmas. It was just for fun. My sister likes decorating so I think that was part of the reason why.”

 

“We should get a tree for the apartment.”

 

She smirked. “A little late for that now, don’t you think?” It had already worn well into December, Hanukkah was already over. Most stores would have definitely sold out by now, but she did appreciate the gesture.

 

Ilse smiled at her, getting lost in Wendla’s eyes for a moment and forgetting her train of thought.

 

“Next year,” she said, careful because she knew she needed to keep aware of her surroundings. There were quite a number of people out. “I think we should get a tree and have everyone decorate it with us. It’ll be nice.”

 

“We’ll be like a real family then.”

 

“Aren’t we always?”

 

She smiled. Of course they were.

 

The two of them skated passed Georg, who’d taken to using the wall in the hopes that it would keep him upright, and Otto, who was trying not to laugh about it. Wendla could see Thea, Martha and Anna further up, their chain had spread out at some point and they were trying to get back to being as close to each other as possible. Ernst must have coaxed Hanschen into taking a selfie with him because the two of them had paused in the center of the rink, and Ernst was holding his phone carefully in his hands, probably worried it would shatter if he dropped it now.

 

“Oh, badger is on the move,” Ilse said next to her, pointing to where Melchior was trying to help Moritz onto the ice. The two girls rushed over, skirting to a stop next to them.

 

“If you let me fall over, Melchior, I swear I’ll break up with you. I’ll break up with in front of all these random people and it’ll be really embarrassing,” Moritz was saying. It would have been a decent threat if his voice wasn’t a whole octave higher than usual.

 

Even so, Melchior didn’t miss a beat. He was already on the ice, steady and holding his hand out to Moritz, who was leaning against the wall, still too scared to move from solid ground. “I’m not going to let you fall. I know you can do this.”

 

“Not really. I hate this.”

 

“It’s really not as hard as you think,” Wendla smiled, trying to be reassuring even though she’d startled him. Moritz had obviously been too caught up to realise that the two of them had joined them. “If you’re not going to trust Melchior, then you can at least trust me,” she added.

 

“I _do_ trust, Melchior,” he sighed, “I just don’t trust myself or, you know, the giant blades that I’m currently wearing.”

 

“You’re so valid,” Ilse smirked.

 

He just rolled his eyes in response. Moritz took Melchior’s hand, though he still looked incredibly wary.

 

“I’ve got you,” Melchior smiled. “I promise.”

 

He nodded, looked down at the ice and took a deep breath. “Ok I have a free hand, which one of you wants to take it,” he muttered.

 

Wendla laughed and took his other hand gently. “You’ve totally got this, Moritz.”

 

“I totally don’t.”

 

“You don’t need to. You’ve got me,” Melchior reminded.

 

“Yeah, you’re why I’m in this mess. Ok, whatever. I’ll skate. And die. Probably.”

 

“Come on, you know I would never let that happen.”

 

Wendla could tell that Moritz was finally starting to believe him. Well, it had only taken about an hour. That really wasn’t all that long in Moritz-time. Considering it’d taken him about one million years to start believing that Melchior loved him too. Moritz took a incredibly careful step onto the ice, using both Melchior and Wendla as anchors. Once he thought he was steady enough, he let go of Wendla’s hand, still holding onto Melchior.

 

“See?” Melchior smiled. “It’s not that bad. Right?”

 

Wendla marvelled for a moment at just how happy Melchior looked. She hadn’t seen him this at ease since before the holiday season had started. It seemed the winter magic was kicking in.

 

“I still don’t like it,” Moritz muttered, but a smile was tugging at his lips.

 

Wendla caught Ilse’s eye, beaming up at her. “I think we’ll leave you two to get your bearings,” she said.

 

Moritz nodded. “Don’t let me keep you.”

 

“Godspeed, my friend,” Ilse smirked.

 

“Oh, there is no way I’m going that fast.”

 

She laughed, patted Moritz carefully on the shoulder and took Wendla’s hand again.

 

“We’ll just go slowly,” Melchior reassured.

 

Ilse couldn’t miss the opportunity for a good joke. “You’re a real expert at that, aren’t you?”

 

“Bye, Ilse.”

 

Moritz caught Wendla’s eye, sharing a symbolic moment of solidarity with her.

 

“Just try and have fun, Moritz,” she said.

 

He nodded. “Yeah I - I’ll definitely try.”

 

Wendla gave him a reassuring smile and then tugged on Ilse’s hand gently. As the two of them skated off again, Melchior and Moritz started having a very small argument about the wall (“You don’t need the wall, Moritz. I don’t care if Georg is using it. He’s an idiot and it doesn’t help your balance.”)

 

“Young love truly is the biggest miracle of all,” Ilse said, letting go of Wendla’s hand and wrapping her arm around her shoulders instead, pulling her easily against her side.

 

Wendla counted three seconds until Ilse started laughing at that. She laughed too. “They’ve earned it at this stage.”

 

“Never said they hadn’t.”

 

The two of them passed Otto and Georg - who was quick to yell “that’s not fair!” at them - again. They paused next to Martha, Anna, and Thea for a few minutes. Skating in line with them and keep up idle conversation about how cute Moritz and Melchior were being on the other side of the ice. Hanschen was no longer showing off how well he could execute a double axial. He was just skating and holding Ernst’s hand in his, though the two of them were still pretty close to the center, going just that little bit faster than everyone else.

 

“We should head to the middle,” Ilse muttered, leaning down a little so that just Wendla could hear her.

 

“Why’s that?”

 

She shrugged. “Take a picture and all that. I wish everyone could join us, but I’m pretty sure that if Georg and Moritz even made it there they’d never be able to get out again.”

 

Wendla hummed in agreement. Georg was still clinging to the wall of the ice rink like it was the only thing keeping him (sort of) upright. She followed Ilse’s lead as the two of them moved right to the center of the rink and then paused. Wendla looked up at her girlfriend, tilting her head slightly to the side because Ilse seemed kind of nervous now and she had no idea why that would be.

 

“Are you ok?” she asked.

 

Ilse smiled at her, nodding. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

 

“Now?”

 

“Yeah. Now. If that’s ok.”

 

Wendla squeezed her hands gently. “Of course it’s ok.”

 

Ilse locked eyes with her. “I love you,” she said.

 

Wendla beamed up at her, leaned up to kiss her cheek gently. “I love you too,” she smiled.

 

“I’ve been thinking about something,” she continued. “You love snow, and winter, and the holidays and joy.”

 

“You’ve been thinking about me?” she teased.

 

“Oh, I’m always thinking about you.”

 

The two of them laughed. Ilse blinked three times in quick succession to try and hide the fact that she was tearing up. Wendla absolutely noticed, reaching up to stroke her cheek gently. “Is something wrong?” she asked, concern finding its way into her expression.

 

Ilse shook her head, smiling, her fingers tapping Wendla’s for a second. “The opposite. You’re the love of my life, you know that?”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Is that why you’re getting all sappy right now?” she teased, dropped her hand and just held Ilse’s again.

 

“That’s part of it,” she laughed, wiping at her eyes. “I just want you to know how much you mean to me.”

 

Wendla squeezed her hands again. “I do know that.”

 

“So, I wanted to ask you something,” she said.

 

Wendla nodded, smiling.

 

“At least 98% of the people we love are here, and we’re in one of your favourite places.”

 

“It’s the snow. Don’t you think it makes it really magical?”

 

Ilse smiled. “Yeah, but everything’s magical with you.”

 

Wendla was tearing up now. She pulled Ilse into a tight hug, holding onto her for a good few minutes. “What did you want to ask me?”

 

“You have to let go of me for that.”

 

“Not likely,” she muttered.

 

Ilse laughed as Wendla pulled away from her, though not very much.

 

“I’ve been thinking about this a lot recently,” she explained, “and I thought that now would be a good time. I even went to see your mum a few weeks ago to get her blessing because I know that’s what you would want.” Ilse could see in her eyes that Wendla had caught on now. She shuffled in the pocket of her coat for a moment.

 

“Ilse, are you -” she broke off, unable to finish the question, a hand already coming up to cover her mouth.

 

“Wendla Bergmann,” she muttered, a small shake in her voice that wasn’t usually there. She let go of Wendla’s hand, pulling a ring box out of her pocket and dropping very carefully to one knee on the ice. “Would you do me the absolute honor of becoming my wife?”

 

Wendla sniffled, quickly blinking back tears of joy so that she could say, “Yes! Ilse, of course. Absolutely.”

 

Ilse beamed up at her, sliding the ring onto Wendla’s finger with shaking hands and let her pull her to her feet. Wendla crushed her in a hug, which Ilse met with just as much force. She picked her up and spun her around, kissing her quickly. Both of them were laughing because it’s all they could do. There was too much joy to go around. The two of them pulled away from each other when they heard someone slide to a stop next to them.

 

“Did you two just get fucking _engaged_?” Ernst asked, eyes wide with the pure bliss of the situation.

 

Wendla looked down at the ring on her finger. It was perfect. Delicate with a very small diamond. “Yes,” she muttered, wiping at her eyes.

 

“Holy shit!”

 

Wendla let Ernst pull her into a hug, laughing again at just how happy they were both were in this moment. “Language,” she chastised, smirking. “There’s kids around.”

 

“Sorry, I’m just so excited for you two!” he said, letting go of her and reaching for Ilse next.

 

Wendla looked up at Hanschen. He was beaming down at her. She didn’t think she’d seen him this happy since -

 

“Welcome to the engaged club,” he teased.

 

“Hopefully soon enough it’ll be the marriage club.”

 

“That’s the plan.”

 

“So do I get a hug or what?”

 

He rolled his eyes, pulling her easily into a hug.

 

“Moritz!” Ernst called, eyes searching the ice quickly and locking onto him.

 

“I know!” he replied, “but I can’t come out there!” This was followed shortly by Moritz batting at Melchior’s shoulder and saying, “You are _not_ picking me up,” a little too loudly.

 

“We’ll come to you!”

 

Wendla was vaguely aware of the other people around. She could feel eyes on them, but she didn’t give that any thought, didn’t care about it at all. She cared about reaching the rest of her friends and letting Moritz pull her ever so carefully into a hug (she noticed Melchior’s hand on Moritz’s lower back, helping to keep him steady and couldn’t help but smile).

 

“Not sure how I feel about hugging you when I could slip. Might have to give you a proper hug later,” Moritz muttered. She winked at Melchior over his shoulder, letting him know that she could handle Moritz for now and he should absolutely give Ilse a hug, which he was quick to do.

 

Ilse practically bounced in place while hugging him. She wasn’t sure why proposing had given her some kind of adrenaline rush, but that was definitely what she was feeling. “You better be next, bitch,” she whispered in his ear, quiet enough that none of the others would have even known she’d spoken.

 

“Yeah, don’t rush me. I’m nervous about it.”

 

“So you _have_ been thinking about it?”

 

“Near constantly.”

 

“God that’s sweet.” She pulled away, holding onto his shoulders.

 

“I’m happy for you,” he said.

 

“You better be.”

 

The next thing she felt was Martha all but crashing into her, not quite able to stop fast enough in her excitement to get over to them all.

 

“If everyone’s hugging can we get off the ice?” Moritz asked, reaching out for Melchior because Wendla had let go of him and he felt far too unsteady on his own feet. Melchior was at his side in a second, sliding an arm around his waist. Moritz relaxed into his touch.

 

“Get this one off the ice, then I want a hug,” Wendla smirked, wrapping an arm around Anna who was now clinging to her side.

 

“Your wish is my command,” Melchior replied, starting to carefully lead Moritz to closest exit point.

 

The second they were all off the ice and into normal footwear, Moritz threw his arms around his two friends, pulling them into a simultaneous hug.

 

“See? This is a lot better,” he muttered.

 

***

 

Christmas Eve brought with it their annual tradition of piling into Wendla and Ilse’s tiny living room and arguing over what horrible Christmas movies they should watch this year. Half of them didn’t even celebrate Christmas, but that didn’t stop them from buying as much santa shaped chocolates and holiday themed candy as they could. It was a special tactic that assured they would all be together on Christmas morning, which was something that they all preferred. Very few of them were in contact with their parents, so they made their own family.

 

“Are we watching the new Netflix movie? Because we did that last year and it was a blessing and I think that needs to be a new tradition,” Ernst was saying. He was currently sitting in Hanschen’s lap, a glass on eggnog already in one hand and a santa hat carefully crammed onto his head. Every year he made it his mission to ensure that they were all wearing one by the end of the night.

 

“Is it even a Christmas movie?” Ilse asked, helping Wendla and Martha pour the insane amount of various treats into bowls that they could easily pass around the room. Sure, some families had a Christmas dinner with turkey and whatever, but they had marshmallows and candy canes so who was the real winner.

 

“It’s set during Christmas so yes?”

 

“Are we watching _Love Actually_ this year?” Thea asked, snagging a bowl of chocolate and offering some to Anna.

 

“Isn’t the point to watch _bad_ Christmas movies?” Moritz replied. He was curled up against Melchior’s side, already looking like he’d fall asleep the second he got the chance.

 

“Look as long as we don’t watch _Elf_ again, I’m fine with anything,” Melchior added, taking the bowl of marshmallows that Ilse offered him.

 

“What do you have against _Elf_?” she smirked.

 

“My father made us watch it every Christmas. Every single one, Ilse. If I have to sit through it ever again, I won’t make it out alive.”

 

“Elf is banned,” Moritz muttered. “No Will Farrell movies in this house. They’re cursed.”

 

“Georg, can you Google ‘most cursed Christmas movies,” Wendla laughed, taking a seat on the other side of Moritz and pulling Ilse down with her.

 

“On it,” he replied. He was lying on the floor, with his head resting in Otto’s lap. Otto was currently trying to coax Anna into giving him one of the rainbow candy canes - rainbow because why would they bother with plain red and green when they were all gay. “So whatever _The Spirit of Christmas_ is popped up, but so did 900 photos of _Bad Santa_.”

 

“Is there like a list?”

 

“ _Horror Movie Christmas_ ,” Otto read over his shoulder. “Do I even want to know?”

 

“Horror movies are for Halloween,” Ilse reminded. “Where’s the cheesy shit?”

 

“16 Terrible Christmas movies on Netflix that you have to watch,” Georg said, clicking on the link easily.

 

“Sounds promising,” Martha smiled.

 

“Ok, so they’re all romance Christmas movies …”

 

“Yes!” Wendla cheered. “We stan romance in this house.”

 

“Any gay ones?” Ilse asked, around a mouthful of chocolate.

 

“Nope.”

 

“Illegal.”

 

Eventually they came to the conclusion that they should just start the new Netflix movie and then go from there. They managed to make it through about four different films and six different literary debates about what made a Christmas movie, and why most of them were bad before it reached midnight. When it did so, they all started muttering ‘Merry Christmas’ to each other. Melchior shook Moritz’s shoulder gently, he’d sort of fallen asleep at some point during the fourth movie and Melchior almost felt bad waking him.

 

“Hey,” he smiled.

 

Moritz just groaned in response, snuggling closer to him.

 

“It’s Christmas.”

 

He opened an eye, looking up at his boyfriend. “I’m Jewish. Let me sleep.”

 

He laughed, ran his fingers through Moritz’s hair gently. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

 

“Merry Christmas, Melchi.”

 

Melchior kissed his forehead quickly. “Merry Christmas.”

 

“Alright, losers, who wants presents?” Ernst asked a little too loudly for this time of night, but his noise filter had dropped off halfway through the third movie. He jumped quickly to his feet, wobbling just a little. Hanschen spotted him easily, stopping him from falling over. When he caught Ilse’s eye, he smirked.

 

“Sit back down, I’ll get them,” he said, standing and nudging Ernst back into his seat.

 

“I’m ... love you.”

 

He rolled his eyes, a soft smile appearing on his face. “Yeah, I know.”

 

Hanschen left the room, followed by Thea, Ilse and Georg. Wendla jumped into Ernst’s lap.

 

“So why presents?” she asked. “Last I checked, you didn’t believe in Christmas.”

 

He nodded, though the movement was slower than it usually would be. “I believe in presents,” he explained.

 

“Right answer,” Martha praised. She nudged Moritz because she was sure that presents would get his attention, but he just nudged her back instead. “What’s it like having the sleepiest boyfriend in the world?” she asked Melchior.

 

“Fuck off,” Moritz replied.

 

“It speaks.”

 

Melchior shrugged. “I like it,” he said.

 

“Gay!” Otto hollered from the other side of them room.

 

“I like you,” Moritz muttered into his shoulder.

 

Melchior smiled down at him. “God, I hope so.”

 

“Are you allowed to say the Lord’s name in vain on Christmas?” Wendla asked.

 

“Honestly, Wendla, you can say whatever you want. If someone was listening then they’d try to stop you and that never happens.”

 

She laughed. “Thank you for bringing atheist discourse tonight. Christmas wouldn’t be the same without it.”

 

Moritz sat up, finally giving in to wanting to be a part of all the conversations in the room. “You know, dating you is like dating a preacher but worse.”

 

When Melchior looked down at him, he looked legitimately upset. “I’m sorry?”

 

Moritz just laughed. “I was joking.”

 

He smiled at that.

 

“You get sensitive when you’re tired. It’s cute.”

 

“Could y’all stop flirting and help give out these presents?” Ilse asked. She was stopped in the doorway, holding far too many things at once.

 

“Bold of you to assume I can’t do both,” Melchior replied. He stood up, leaning down to kiss Moritz (which earned a mix of joking groans and ‘awws’ from the room) before heading over to help her hand everything out.

 

“Anyway, I’m glad we’re all here together and I love you all and Happy Holidays and whatever,” she said. “Here, take some tokens of love.”

**Author's Note:**

> I realised after I posted last years Christmas fic that most of these kids are Jewish so I tried to write that in this time around. Anyways, thank you for reading. You can find me over at [potter-awakening](http://www.potter-awakening.tumblr.com/) if you want to chat!!


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